China claims third artistic swimming gold at FINA worlds

BUDAPEST, June 23 (Xinhua) -- Twin sisters Wang Liuyi and Wang Qianyi captured the third artistic swimming title for China at the 19th FINA World Championships with victory in the women's Duet Free final here on Thursday.

The 25-year-old twin sisters earned the gold with 95.5667 points, adding to their success in the women's Duet Technical and Team Technical.

Ukraine's Aleksiiva sisters Maryna and Vladyslava got the silver medal with 94.1667 points, while Anna-Maria and Eirini Alexandria from Austria came in third place with 92.8000.

The Wang twins are no strangers to Budapest as they also won the Team Free Combination at the 17th FINA World Championships in 2017.

"I feel very happy and excited to win the third gold medal for the Chinese artistic swimming team," older sister Wang Liuyi told Xinhua following the final. "The help of the coach and the encouragement of teammates have given us a lot of motivation. We have overcome fatigue and various difficulties. I did very well today and I'm satisfied with my performance."

Wang Qianyi said: "This is the first time for us to compete in both the duet and the team events, so I felt a little bit of pressure."

"In spite of fatigue, we were able to withstand this pressure. I feel very happy," she added.

Australian teenager Mollie O'Callaghan won the women's 100m freestyle title in 52.67 seconds, followed by Sweden's Sarah Sjostrom and American Torri Huske in second and third places with 52.80 and 52.92 respectively.

China's Cheng Yujie finished fifth in 53.58.

In the women's 200m breaststroke, Lilly King of the United States claimed gold in 2:22.41. Australia's Jenna Strauch came second in 2:23.04, and King's compatriot Kate Douglass finished third in 2:23.20.

The men's 200m backstroke also ended with Americans winning gold and bronze medals, with Ryan Murphy finishing first with 1:54.52 and Shaine Casas placing third in 1:55.35. The silver medal went to Luke Greenbank from Britain with 1:55.16.

Australia's Zac Stubblety-Cook won the men's 200m breaststroke title in 2:07.07 while Japan's Yu Hanaguruma and Sweden's Erik Persson tied for second place in 2:08.38.

The United States won the last final of Thursday, the men's 4x200m freestyle relay with a time of 7:00.24, beating the Australians (7:03.50) and the British team (7:04.00). China finished eighth with 7:10.93.